1917–1918

4
37675
LETTER TO THE LEADERS OF PETROGRAD ORGANIZATIONS
July 20, 1918

It is necessary to dispatch the maximum number of workers from Peter:
1) several dozen leaders;
2) thousands of "rank-and-file" members.

Otherwise we shall perish, because the situation with the Czechoslovaks is out of control.

In such a situation, to "sit" on the "well-being" of Peter and to "begrudge" sending people from there! Let even the majority of ballots in the Petrograd Soviet fall from 98% (we have 98%) to 51%! What of it!

We shall not perish if it even (even!) comes to 49% in Soviets not ours in Peter (whenever that may be). But we shall surely perish from the Czechoslovaks if we do not make desperate efforts to add hundreds and thousands of leading workers for transforming Kinel into something solid. This is not an exaggeration, but a precise assessment. You will be answerable for destruction if you are stingy and preserve "Peter."

Reply!

Greetings! Your Lenin

Printed from a typewritten copy.

44523
TELEGRAM TO THE PETROGRAD COMMITTEE OF COMMUNISTS
July 27, 1918

We have conferred with the agitation-provisioning group from the Vyborg district that has arrived here. Such a group is undoubtedly very much needed and will play an enormous role in Kazan province, to which it is being directed.

But there is now no less acute a need for party workers who could on the Czechoslovak front enlighten, unite, and discipline Soviet troops. The provisioning task cannot be resolved without the suppression of the Czechoslovak-White Guard mutiny. It is necessary to direct here now numerous active, combative party workers. Petrograd's complaint that we are depopulating Petrograd is without foundation. Where else should we find the best agitators and organizers for nationwide tasks than in Petrograd? Moscow has already given us about 200 agitators-commissars to the Czechoslovak front. Petrograd must give no fewer. Former military men are desirable, but not obligatory: it is sufficient to be a firm, devoted revolutionary in order to render invaluable services to the cause of struggle against Volga and Urals counter-revolution.

We await your energetic and swift support, comrades!

By order of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party

Lenin. Sverdlov

Printed from a typewritten copy.

3350
NOTE VIA DIRECT LINE TO THE CHAIRMAN OF THE PETROGRAD SOVIET*
July 27, 1918

We have just received news that Alekseyev in the Kuban, having up to 60,000 troops, is advancing against us, implementing a plan of combined assault by the Czechoslovaks, the British, and Alekseyev's Cossacks. In view of this and in view of the statement of the Peter workers who arrived here—Kayurov, Chugarin, and others—that Peter could give tenfold more if it were not for the opposition of the Peter section of the Central Committee**—in view of this I categorically and ultimatively insist on the cessation of all opposition and on the dispatch from Peter of tenfold greater numbers of workers. Such precisely is the demand of the party's Central Committee.

I categorically warn that the position of the Republic is dangerous and that the men of Peter, by delaying the dispatch of workers from Peter to the Czech front, will take upon themselves responsibility for the possible destruction of the entire cause.

Lenin

* On the original, written in the hand of V. I. Lenin, there is his instruction to his secretary: "NB: Return this paper to me with a notation of the hour at which it was transmitted to Peter to the Smolny. Lenin."

** This refers to the Zinoviev group, which opposed the implementation of Lenin's policy and cultivated in the Petrograd organizations anti-state parochial tendencies.